Video by Tom George/CNS-TV
BALTIMORE – NASA is launching its biggest telescope project since the Hubble. The project, which has won approval from the U.S. Senate but awaits action in the House of Representatives, is not expected to launch until 2018. But, a full-scale model of the James Webb Telescope was recently unveiled at the Maryland Science Center in Baltimore.
The telescope, as wide as a tennis court, will use the latest technology to collect data and help solve some of the mysteries of the universe. That includes infrared technology to take pictures of faraway stars and galaxies.
The Science Center’s full-scale model is set up along the Inner Harbor and will greet visitors to the center. U.S. Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) who was on hand to cut the ribbon for the new exhibit, said she hopes the project will “secure America’s place in astronomy for the next 50 years.”
Mikulski was joined by Johns Hopkins University Professor Adam Riess, who won the 2011 Nobel Prize for physics. He said projects like the Webb telescope are crucial in helping scientists like himself to conduct research about outerspace.